Thursday, 30 June 2016

Anyone visiting Wales
can hardly avoid noticing that there are a lot of sheep - about four
sheep for every person living in Wales!

And where there are
sheep, there's a woollen industry.

Today, most Welsh wool
is used in the carpet industry but in earlier centuries, almost every
cottage had a loom for weaving blankets and clothing, often
in the traditional Welsh Tapestry patterns. And some of the original
Welsh Woollen Mills survive today, some as museums, others as working
mills using patterns found in the Public Records Office and dating
back to the 1700s.

In earlier times, Welsh
Tapestry blankets were given as wedding gifts and dowries and were
kept as family heirlooms. More recently a Welsh Tapestry blanket was
presented to President Obama when he visited Wales.

Everyone knows about
Scottish tartans but Welsh Tapestry is less well-known, despite its
long history and its 'revivals' at various times since the 1960s.
Blankets and other textile gifts with these patterns, such as
cushions and coats, are as likely to be found in Welsh Craft and Gift
Shops as wooden 'Love Spoons' and Little Welsh Red Dragons.

But Welsh Tapestry
blankets are expensive. Of course, they are not really 'tapestries'
but a unique type of 'double-weave' cloth, sometimes known as
double-cloth, and the weaving process involves, as the name implies,
a complicated interlocking of two layers of cloth. So, while they are
warm and hard-wearing as well as attractive, they are not cheap to
produce.

As someone who lives in
Wales and who is also addicted to pattern-making - and especially
drawn to those with some kind of traditional or ethnic origin - it
was only a matter of time before I turned my attention to Welsh
Tapestry patterns.

And I have chosen a few of them to use as patterns
on non-textile gifts, such as coffee mugs and serving trays as well
as cases and sleeves to protect your electronic devices!

Here are some of them -Click on the image below to see the full collection -

Thursday, 2 June 2016

We don't necessarily
need to know anything about Islamic Art and Design to gaze in
wonderment at the patterned walls and screens of the Alhambra, the Blue Mosque, or the typically tiled floors and walls of Morocco!

You will probably have
noticed that the patterns are all based on a geometric grid and some
of these grids can be extremely complex.

If you read my last
month's blog post about William Morris, you may remember that
many of his contemporaries also created abstract patterns based on
grids. But William Morris took that one step further, using a
geometric grid to provide the structure on which to build his floral
patterns.

Islamic pattern design
does make use of some floral motifs and motifs taken from Nature but it generally depicts them in a much more formalised way.

And whereas you would
expect to see images of saints and holy figures in many Christian
churches, this is highly unlikely in a Muslim mosque. There are
differences of opinion amongst Islamic scholars about whether depicting human beings in art
and design is idolatrous and therefore contrary to the teachings of
Islam, and you can read about them in detail HERE.

But the beautiful
patterns that decorate Muslim places of worship are no less related
to the religious doctrines of Islam than the statues and paintings in
a Christian cathedral.

For instance, the geometric shape we call a 'circle' is linked to the concept of 'Infinity', which in itself is a property of Allah. This article on the BBC website goes into these fascinating connections in more detail than I have time for here.

And in the Islamic
cultural traditions, crafts and decorative arts are regarded as being
of equal status to painting and sculpture. So it's not surprising
that these have been developed to such an awe-inspiring degree!

(On the left is one of my original screenprints, from the 1980s, of a very complex Islamic pattern.)

While I love to create flowing, painterly floral patterns and mini-prints that are often based on the flowers and other plants - even
weeds! - in my garden, I am also drawn to the apparent simplicity of
geometric grids.

I stress that the word 'simplicity' must be
qualified by 'apparent' because many of the traditional Islamic
'mosaic' patterns, while appearing straightforward, are in fact based
on a complex system of geometric grids, placed on top of one another
to create a harmonious whole.

The
patterns are often constructed by overlaying circles, squares, rectangles and
other geometric shapes and I find it fascinating that just these few 'building
blocks' can result in such a variety of different patterns! On the right is an example from David Wade's book (see below) and I'm sure you can find his explanation of how the grid pattern was built up, if you visit his website.

I first
learnt a bit about Islamic Art when I was designing patterns for
cushions in a screen-printing class nearly thirty years ago. Coming
from a background of landscape painting, almost always using a
rectangular canvas, I was finding it hard to adapt to designing on a
square. So my teacher lent me a very helpful book by David Wade - "Pattern
in Islamic Art".

I've recently discovered his
wonderful website which you can explore HERE

You'll find inspiring slide-shows to enjoy as well as
detailed drawings, diagrams and analyses to learn from if you are so inclined!

As we approach the Holy
Month of Ramadan that culminates in the celebration of Eid-al-Fitr in
early July, I think it's appropriate to show some of the Greeting
Cards, Gift Bag and Wrapping Paper that I've created using, in many
cases, Islamic Patterns:

I hope you've enjoyed
this brief look into the traditions of Pattern in Islamic Art and the
ways in which we can draw inspiration from the geometric pattern
grids that it's based on to create beautiful Greeting Cards and
modern Home and Fashion Accessories for everyone.